The Monster and the Child

About the project

The Monster and the Child is a french fantastic short movie of approximately 15 minutes, made as a part of the end of the EICAR’s course.

STORY

Timeo, seven years old, is scared by a living monster under his bed. Since his parents don’t believe him, he decides to act and to start communicating with the monster.

INTENTION NOTES

The idea of the story came to me with the somehow clear picture of a child slipping under his bed, revealing at the last moment a monstrous hand. From this point, a short synopsis rapidly emerged: the story of a little boy befriending a monster whose existence is denied by the parents. A lonely boy, strangely close to the monster, to the point of turning into one himself.

I’ve always been fascinated by those stories and meetings of childhood and of imagination, in Spielberg’s cinema (E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial or more recently the BFG), in Pan’s Labyrinth by Guillermo Del Toro or in A Monster Calls by Juan Antonio Bayona. Each of these authors or movies has affected me in their own way and influenced too, in my life or in the cinema I want to share.

Nevertheless, I soon reach a stop with the subject’s development and since I didn’t want to ruin a theme and a story I cared for, I decided to appeal to Marius and to his sensibility upon this universe.

François Javerliat

CAST

Noam Bohin,Timeo

Stéphane Vernier, the monster

Jessie Lambotte, the mother

Alain Tournay, the father

REFERENCES AND INSPIRATIONS

Credits: Pan’s Labyrinth, The BFG, E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, A Monster Calls, Monsters, Inc.

What are the funds for?

Crowd founding represents approximately half of the movie’s finance, which is completed by personal contributions. With the EICAR furnishing all the technical material, all the expense can be dedicated to the artistic and logistic aspects of the movie. To better understand where goes the money, here’s the details of the expenses:

MAKEUP AND COSTUMES: 900€
Maybe the most important category ! The movie’s monster will be entirely made with makeup (prosthetic and painted body), along with a significant part of the costume. All this has a cost in order to make the monster credible on the screen. Here are some researches made by Albane and Manon, costume designers on the project.

LOCATION MANAGEMENT: 900€
Great ! We have all the ideas, but now we have to put it all in order. Shooting a movie requires a big logistic and organization, if only to feed the downed of starving mouths of the technicians, whose stomachs are way bigger than a monster’s. Transportation, gaz, last-minute errands, all this participated in the shooting everyday life and has to be prepared.

SETS: 450€
Wouldn’t it be a shame to see our dear monster shuffles in front of a black background? Of course it would. In order to recreate the atmosphere of timeo’s house and mostly of his room, a special attention has to be dedicated to the sets, in choosing or modifying them.

POST-PRODUCTION: 280€
“Finally, the shooting is over!” Certainly, but the work is about to begin. Between image editing, sound editing, special effects, standardization and mixing etc., post production is a whole adventure in itself, which can sometimes cost a lot. This budget’s part will be mostly used for the sound in the post production, to take great care of your ears during the showing.

ULULE: 120€
That’s the estimated amount that will take Ulule for commission in this crowd founding. After all, they also have to eat !

CASUAL EXPENSES: 200€
Despite deciding of a maximum, there is always a small problem in a movie’s creation. Nothing to be worried about if we have planned it and can fall back on our feet. This is what this part is about.

About the project owner

We are a team of students and young professionals coming from different schools, brought together around a common project which resonates in all of us:

Director: François Javerliat, third year student in EICAR, director/organization subject

Scriptwriter: Marius Rumillat, first year student in the Ecole de la Cité, screenplay subject

Unit production manager: Marie Bourdin, first year student in EICAR, Production master

First assistant director: Gabriel Da Silva, third year student in EICAR, director/organization subject

Location manager: Yvan Soa, second year student in EICAR

Director of photography: Clément Jacquel third year student in EICAR, director/technic subject

Production sound mixer: Julien Marchadier, third year student in EICAR, sound subject